Crime and Punishment
by Izumi's Apprentice
Summary: Jaden, a seven year old boy, gets into trouble and has to go through a trial for his punishment. His prosecuting attorney? His own mother! And his father doesn't believe he deserves the punishment, but...his wife sticks firm on her decision. Please R&R!


Disclaimer: I don't own FMA. And I don't own the Into the Woods' "Children Will Listen" lyrics at the end; those belong to the wonderfully talented Steven Sondheim. Check him out!

Author's Notes: This story is actually number seven of the Royai100 Themes, but I (with a little nudging from MoonStarDutchess) decided to post it as a separate story altogether. I hope you enjoy this story. Please R&R

Crime and Punishment

The room was filled with silence as a black-haired boy with auburn eyes waited in anticipation for his prosecuting lawyer to arrive. The boy was fearful of the woman and what would occur within the confines of this high-ceilinged, carpeted, sofa and couch adorned room. He looked around; behind him held the main entrance into the room, and some plastic chairs his friends normally sat in when they came over to play; currently the audience, a variety of his stuffed animals, sat there expressionless. To the left of him, sat his favorite big bear, his lawyer, and further right sat the other table where one of his frog animals sat there and the empty seat for the prosecution. In front and to the right of the Plaintiff's table sat two rows of chairs where other stuffed animals of the four-legged kind sat, awaiting the trial to begin. In the center of the room sat a lot of books and on top his stuffed dog, Rilee, playing the judge in this courtroom.

There was a noise heard out of the young boy's right ear, to which he recognized as the offense entering the room. He chanced a peek back and saw the tall woman in a black skirt, nice white blouse, and blonde hair up as if she were at work, and the same auburn eyes looking back at him calmly. The boy gulped; sweat starting to show up on the surface of his pale skin.

She sat down in the chair, a little uncomfortably, and her full lips opened to begin the boy's prosecution. "In the case of the Mother against the son, Jaden, I the prosecution, will begin." She stood up and faced Judge Rilee. "The defendant is charged with one count of destruction of prohibited personal property and one count of lying under oath. The first piece of evidence is my grandfather's, the defendant's great-grandfather's, priceless vase that he bought in Xing many years ago. That is to say, fragments of it." She produced said fragments from a bag carefully placing them on the table for judge, jury, audience and the boy to see.

The seven-year-old boy gulped, and his body stiffened at what was to come next. Her eyes flicked over to his noticing the sadness and fear in them. "The next piece of evidence is a recording of Jaden's attempts at telling me that he did not have anything to do with the destruction of the vase. If the jury would also take into consideration that I found the defendant standing over the vase when I took this recording." She placed the device on the table to the left of the fragments and let it play through.

"_Jaden? – light gasp- Did you break my vase?!"_

"_No!! Of course I didn't. It means a lot to you, right? Why would I do that?!"_

"_Are you lying to me?"_

"_No…no of course, I'm not!"_

"Evidence that the prosecution has now gathered points to the obvious culprit and that is Jaden!" She said pointing to him, electronic gasps being heard around the room, frightening the defendant a bit.

"I didn't mean to, honest! It was an accident, Ril-I mean Judge Rilee!! I'm sorry!!!" Jaden had stood up but plopped back down into his chair and was now crying into his arms on the plastic table.

"The court has made its decision," said a scratchy voice from the jury area. Jaden looked up, eyes glistening with his tears. The prosecuting female stood up and walked over to the table in front of the jury and picked up a slip of paper.

She read from it, "The defendant is found guilty on one charge of destruction of property and lying under oath. His sentence…" She peered at him, watching his expression. "Is banishment to his room until dinner is ready and no visitation of friends for the next ten days. Does the Defendant understand?"

Jaden stood up, gulping down the lump that was in his throat, trying to be brave like his father always was. "Yes," he said then turned around and left for his room, not crying once on the way there.

The beautiful blonde-haired woman sighed, a hand on her hip. "I'm sorry, son."

----

"Hey, Jaden, I'm home!!" A black-haired man in a blue military uniform called, walking into the front room with a small bag in his hand. His wife appeared from the kitchen with a white apron around her waist. "Huh? Hey, Riza, where's Jade-?"

"He won't be coming to see you until supper's ready," she told him.

"…Why?"

Riza sighed, a finger rubbing her temple lightly. "We had a trial today, and the jury found him guilty," she said, motioning towards one of the living rooms where the 'court' was still set up. "Here, let me show you, Roy." She took his hand lightly and led him to the right side of the room where her table had been. She pointed at the fragments of her vase.

"What is that?" he asked looking at it carefully.

"Grandfather's vase from Xing."

Roy gasped, dark eyes wide. "Wha- What happened?!"

"Jaden broke it," she said simply.

"Heh, well just leave it to me. I don't know why you sent him to his room over this. I could've just fixed it when I got him. Now, where are the rest of the pieces?" Roy said looking around the room a little amused at seeing all the stuffed animals.

"Roy, this isn't just about the vase being broken. It's also about the fact that your son didn't admit his actions to me. He lied to my face that he didn't break it," Riza said watching her husband's face carefully.

"Come on Rize, boys'll be boys; let him off the leash," he said, still searching for the remaining fragments.

"Roy!"

He turned around, a confused look on his face as he took in his wife's angered face. He cocked his head to the side lightly, encouraging her on.

"Roy, your son BROKE my mother's vase. That's unforgivable. He was playing with the soccer ball YOU gave him for his birthday when we've both explicitly told him to only play with it outside. It should have been in his bucket of toys for outside use. He probably went and got it, bringing it inside and using the ball. Breaking the vase," she said, exasperated at having to explain things to the grown man as if he were their seven-year old son.

Roy had watched her expression carefully, realizing that she was upset about this for some reason and chose his next words even more warily. "Okay, Riza. I'll…I'll go talk to him while you finish supper and sort out this mess. And later tonight if you want, I will fix the vase for you," he said, coming forward and placing his hands on her shoulders, making her look up. "That good, love?" She nodded once before his lips plunged in for a quick, sweet kiss that she returned.

Roy walked off to the stairwell and went upstairs, while Riza returned to the kitchen to finish up dinner. The military man made it to his son's bedroom and knocked upon the surface of the wood, waiting for a reply. Hearing a mumbled response, Roy entered, smiling.

"Hey, buddy. How are ya?"

"Fine," he grumbled, his hands fiddling with some silly putty, black bangs hiding his red puffy eyes.

"Hey…" Roy came over and sat down on the bed, placing a hand on Jaden's right shoulder.

"It's fine…I don't wanna talk about it," he said turning his back to his father and facing the head of his bed.

"If it's about the vase, which I'm guessing it is, your mother means well. She…she's just upset that you didn't listen to her. We've asked you keep that soccer ball outside and only use it outside. We didn't want something like what happened today to happen, but you didn't listen and the vase was broken. I can fix it, but you should really apologize to your mother, all right little man?" Roy said comfortingly.

"But…but it was an accident!" Jaden cried out, falling on the bed face forward starting another crying session.

Roy leaned closer, his hand on the boy's back rubbing it soothingly. "Hey come on, don't cry. Tears don't help anything. Listen to me, Jaden."

The boy sniffed looking up at his father, a small hand coming to rub at his wet cheeks.

"It's not just the vase being broken that is the problem, but…your mother told me you lied to her. Is that true? You lied about not breaking the vase?" Roy asked, his face calm. Jaden sniffed loudly again and nodded his head shamefully.

Roy smiled slightly, shortly thereafter hearing the call up the stairs of dinner being ready. "Let's go apologize to your mother, okay? Tell her you're sorry and try not to cry all right? She'll understand," The man said, encouragingly, standing up and holding his hand out.

Jaden rubbed the back of his right hand over his face, and stood up taking his father's hand. The two males proceeded to the dining room downstairs. The smallish table was set up with the food spread out in the middle and Riza was setting down the cups of milk in the designated areas. She looked at them when they entered and smiled at her pride and joy.

"How are you, Jad-?" Riza wasn't able to finish her question as the young boy had latched himself onto her leg and started crying lightly. "Jaden…"

"I'm sorry! It was an accident! I promise it'll never happen again!!" He cried out, voice muffled in her skirt. Riza smiled, running her fingers through his soft, downy hair.

"Thank you for apologizing, Jaden. I really appreciate it," she told him softly. The three sat down and ate their delicious supper, talking about Roy's day at Headquarters. Jaden was interested in the military business, but Roy and Riza often toned the 'awesomeness' of the job down a bit, not really wishing for their son to join the military.

Later that night after placing Jaden down for bed and lighting a fire in the fireplace, Roy and Riza started in on cleaning up the living room's courtroom appearance. Riza had collected up the audience animals and placed them in baskets to be brought back up to Jaden's room. Roy was picking up animals in the jury area, finding a small recording device stuck on the back of one of the bears. His eyebrows furrowed in confusion, wondering how far his wife had gone with the mock trial.

"What's this?" He held it up for her to see in the glow of the fire.

Riza chuckled lightly. "Press the button," she said, watching as he did so. The scratchy voice came on saying that the court had made its decision.

"That's your voice, with static added," the man said amused.

Riza laughed, pulling off three more devices from the audience animals. "And so are these, just noises of 'ooo'. I wanted Jaden to feel as if he was in a courtroom and being charged. You may say I was heartless because from your perspective it may sound like I was trying to scare him, but I don't care. I got my point across…" she went back to picking up the plastic chairs. "If in an unorthodox way."

Roy smiled, wondering just how the trial had gone, noticing briefly that Jaden's favorite stuffed animal Rilee appeared to be in the judge position. "You have a lot of imagination coming up with this. Or at least ingenuity," he said, not mentioning the 'heartless' comment.

They finished their work in silence and soon were curled up together in front of the fire, enjoying each other's company. Roy sat cross-legged, his arms around Riza's waist. She was sitting in front of his legs, her back against his warm chest, eyes closed in relaxation. The day had been a long one and putting all of that work into the trial had tuckered her out a little more than usual.

"Hey, Rize?"

"Hmm?"

"I…I thought I'd let you know that the reason I was thinking aloud the way I was when I got home was because…well I kinda did the same thing when I was younger," he admitted. Riza straightened up and turned around to face him, attentive. "I was grounded for two weeks and wasn't allowed any sweets or friends during that time. I…didn't want the same thing to happen to our son."

Riza sighed, closing her beautiful auburn eyes and then opening them again. She took Roy's cheeks in her hands and looked him in the eye. "Roy, we can't let him off the hook, his actions should have consequences. Our actions in Ishbal needed consequences and you and I still try and repent for that. You commit a crime you receive punishment. If we don't teach him that now, he won't understand that in the real world. I'm sorry Roy, but it has to be done. You want to be a good father right? And not spoil our child too much?" she asked, her voice soft and loving, a smile gracing her features.

Roy sighed, deep and heavy. "Yeah… So, what IS he in for?"

"Just grounded to his room today and no friends for the next ten days. He loves hanging out with his friends, so I figured that would be the best punishment, instead of grounding him. I mean…what's a 'grounding' entail, anyways? You always have to make that clear, at any rate," she smiled wider at Roy.

"Well, that's good, I guess," he said smiling back. "So…how about a late night snack, honey…?" he asked, smirking.

"I dunno," she said devilishly. "Have you been a good boy or a…bad boy?"

"Oh, I am a very, VERY bad boy…" he said smirking wider before slowly lowering her to the floor and kissing her deeply. Riza giggle lightly, kissing him back.

The fire continued to burn. Both in the fireplace and in the hearts of the Mustang family.

Careful the things you say,  
Children will listen.  
Careful the things you do,  
Children will see.  
And learn.  
Children may not obey,  
But children will listen.

Fin

Hope you enjoyed this story. I might post this separately as a different story, but keep waiting for the next installment in this series. Please review!!


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